A high voters’ turnout of 85.7% was recorded in the repolling at a booth at Dudhwa Khurd village in Rajasthan’s Barmer Lok Sabha constituency on Wednesday. The Election Commission had ordered repolling following the complaints made about the breach of secrecy during voting in the village in the second phase on April 26.
Long separate queues of male and female voters were visible at the Government Senior Secondary School’s polling station in Dudhwa Khurd since the morning despite the sweltering heat. The voting was held from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. under strict security measures. Webcasting of the booth was done after the arrangements made for drinking water and shade for the voters.
Of the 1,294 voters registered at the polling station, 1,109 turned up to exercise their franchise. The sources in the Barmer district administration said the polling was carried out smoothly and no untoward incident was reported during the voting.
Besides a public holiday announced in the village to facilitate polling, a dry day was declared in the areas covered by the polling station till the end of voting. The Congress candidate from Barmer, Ummeda Ram Meghwal, and Bharatiya Janata Party rebel Ravindra Singh Bhati, contesting as an independent candidate, visited the polling booth during the voting.
The voters’ turnout was recorded at 52.94% till 3 p.m., after which it picked up the pace and closed at 85.7% till the end of the polling. Dudhwa Khurd falls in Barmer district’s Chohtan Assembly constituency, where BJP’s Aduram Meghwal won in the 2023 election.
The repolling was necessitated because of the complaints made about the breach of confidentiality of votes, after some videos showing bogus voting and the voters being denied their right to franchise went viral on the social media. The Barmer District Election Officer has since suspended four members of the polling team which had conducted the voting at the booth.
Repolling was earlier held at a polling station at Nandsi village in the Ajmer Lok Sabha constituency on May 2 because of the presiding officer having misplaced the 17-A register of voters.
